just another morning here

Before we get to the manic concert afternoon, a quick catch up:

Friday evening was surprisingly pleasant. Anna went out to a BBQ with a school friend and then when she was reminded about her show rehearsal, dashed over to that as well. The other two children decided not to go to their usual kids’ club as they were too tired, so we popped some popcorn and settled down to watch Pete’s Dragon instead. I’m not sure I’ve ever watched it all the way through!
I got some much-procrastinated-over ironing done, and Steve had a nap And then we waited up for Anna to come home (this is becoming a common occurrence, at 12 yrs old!) Guess I will give up on waiting up after a while, but I always think it’s nice for her to have a little chat with us when she comes in, even if it is only quick!

Had to use my time well on Saturday but I did manage to get everything done. Essential shopping beforehand, then on to orchestra where I was on duty. Josiah joined in with a junk drumming workshop on at the same time as orchestra, which he really enjoyed. He was due to be re-joining orchestra in September and is now prevaricating over whether to join in with percussion rather than playing his violin!

My sister and brother in law popped in to see us on their way down to Cornwall for a holiday (lucky them) so we stopped for a cup of tea with them, but otherwise the afternoon was taken up with cleaning out the guinea pigs and fish, some music practice with Joe, trying to help Abbie with her end of year project (that ended in tears, will have to try again), and Anna did her music practice then sat around looking relaxed, without any homework to do, which annoyed Abbie even more – honestly, I think Y7 has been a doss!

Anna went out to Caitlin’s birthday bash, and after tea the rest of us went out for a walk and found a new local cache, which was much nicer than just slobbing around doing nothing – I like after dinner walks

On to today, which started early with someone coming to look at something we’d advertised in the paper. Thought if I made an early appointment that it would get us up and moving! (sold it, now we just have to take it to pieces and get it downstairs!)
Spent the rest of the morning sorting out a leaving present for the orchestra leader, Hannah’s (messages from the orchestra members framed around a photo montage) and then we had lunch.

Josiah’s concert was first this afternoon. I have grown to love the Suzuki thing over the past four years, and we’ve now known most of these kids for most of that time, so it is really nice to see how they’ve all grown up both in themselves and in their playing. Some of the older ones are *very* impressive these days!

I had tried to encourage Joe to practice a bit this morning because his piece hadn’t been sounding very good over the past few days, but he refused, on the basis that he knew he could do it. I despair, but didn’t want a fight! Steve upheld his refusal and he sat and watched Prince Caspian instead – and then played his piece beautifully. Could do with being louder in the loud bits but the dynamics are there …

During the tea break Steve dashed to drop the girls off at their concert venue, then back in time for the second half, which was all the group performances – enjoyable to listen to although they lost marks for hiding behind music stands, even on the pieces they were playing from memory! Very proud of Joe through all of it, he did really well

The Suzuki concert finished just before 5pm, and the girls’ orchestra concert started at 6pm – couldn’t have packed them in much more closely, but we managed a quick cuppa with Steve’s parents inbetween. Because I knew I’d potentially be fairly rushed, I hadn’t volunteered to help with anything this time, so it was nice not to have to get there early but just to sit and watch Grandma wins lots of grandma points for making it to both concerts; Grandpa joined us for the orchestra one as well.

Stopped to pick up fish & chips on the way home, which was a lovely end to the day. Hustled children to bed rather quickly, caught up on Top Gear (samey) and the news, and that’s about it!

Currently sat watching at Joe’s group lesson so thought I would test the WP iPhone app – haven’t got much else to say though! His group are doing a sponsored practice for three weeks from 15th June, in aid of CLIC. Anyone fancy sponsoring him? I can take donations via paypal

Josiah had his first group lesson with the older, more advanced children in our Suzuki group today (and was sight reading his part in the piece in the video because it was his first time). He found it tough in some ways but managed well, and seemed to really enjoy the extra challenge, having been at the top of the younger group for quite a while now. Probably also a bit pleased to have achieved big kid status in the group – he really likes a couple of the older boys there, although his favourite violin friend wasn’t there today. In fact on the way home Joe was telling me what he would have to practice and being generally super positive about violin, as he has been for a while now (better not speak too soon here though!), which is such a relief after a couple of years of very hard slog!

I meant to write something here over the weekend but didn’t quite get round to it, this quick post will have to do instead.

The beginning of last week was taken up with music; I had the day off work on Monday to accompany Anna and Josiah to the strings day of the Devon Performing Arts Festival. We’d bumped Anna up into the G6 class which she promptly won, so felt very proud of herself for that – and Joe came joint 2nd in his G3 class too, he played beautifully, the best he’s ever played his piece. And as we pointed out later, coming 1st out of 4 was marginally less impressive than coming 2nd out of 7!!

The ultimate best thing, though, was Joe’s admission later in the day that perhaps I’d been right to say he should carry on practicing his violin, as he would like it when he was older. He didn’t quite admit that he liked practicing (does anyone?) but it was excellent to see him get a glimpse of the POINT of it all! Lovely to hear some of the other kids we know performing as well – and I *really* enjoyed having a day off with Anna and Josiah Have said that next year we’ll have to do a woodwind day as well, then Abbie can have a turn, and Anna can play that jolly bassoon of hers!!

Josiah sat his G1 piano exam on Tuesday lunchtime, no results as yet though. Then on Wednesday night we had the primary school Music Extravaganza, where everyone who does any music at school gets to stand up and do their bit. Abbie played her flute duets with Riona, and all three kids sang in the choir, with Anna’s accompaniment on the piano for a couple of the songs. Oh, and my three had learnt a descant for one piece at the last minute, which they sang well, too

The choir has got huge recently, with a lot of very little ones – on the way home I commented that perhaps they should have a KS1 choir and a KS2 choir, then the very next day a letter came home from school announcing the very same thing. They’re also inviting more hangers on (like Anna!) but while I’d quite like to be part of it alongside the kids, that is the half hour in my week which is mine, all mine. Not sure I can give it up! Lots of other great music opportunities from the school next term but I’ll write about those when we get to them.

Spent Thursday and Friday suffering from what felt like extreme exhaustion, to the point that Steve wondered afterwards if I’d had some sort of virus. Felt worse than just a late night after he got home from Glasgow late on Wednesday. Not clever when trying to make decisions about things. Survived, anyway – and immediately felt better after Josiah’s violin lesson on Friday night, which was such an odd time to suddenly recover that I thought perhaps Steve was right (he is, occasionally)!

Anna came home with an extra cello on Thursday – one that she’s been given, it had been sitting in the school cupboard for years and years. We took it to our strings experts in town to see if it was worth restoring properly but as suspected, it’s not. Steve and Anna are still going to try and get it to a playable state, as cheaply as possible, but then I think they’re actually intending to paint it and hang it on the wall rather than anything else! Still, it will be an original and interesting piece of artwork!

The weekend has been uneventful. Orchestra, housework, I spent some time catching up on jobs at the garage, and Steve entertained the children by burning stuff that needed shredding (shredder has given up the ghost) in an old saucepan on the patio!
On Sunday, Abbie, Joe and I went to church then did lunch at Tescos, then more housework/homework/lego while Steve took Anna out for a Subaru meet on the moors.

Going in his subaru means he can only take one passenger so the rest of us had to be left behind even if we’d wanted to go!
Once everyone was home we watched Jumper together which we all enjoyed. Then early nights all round, even despite the hour change – and they’re still not awake this morning!